The plot of Aliens: Colonial Marines, for the most part, has remained a mystery to us. To date, all we really know about the game is that it takes place 17 days after the events of the third film, and a search and rescue team is sent to investigate the U.S.S. Sulaco in search of the missing marines who were dispatched to LV-426.
However, while attending a recent preview event for the game, we learned somewhat of a secret: Corporal Dwayne Hicks will somehow be involved in the campaign portion of the game. Gearbox's Mike Newman, who wrote Aliens: Colonial Marines, told us that he had worked with actor Michael Biehn (the actor who played Hicks) during the development of the game and recorded lines with him for a role in the campaign.
For those unfamiliar, Hicks — one of my favorite characters in the movie Aliens — gets thrown into the role of commanding officer on LV-426 where he is tasked with keeping the remaining marines alive. Throughout the movie, him and Ripley appear to form some sort of bond. *Spoilers* Eventually, some survivors — Hicks included — make it off the planet and nuke the site from space. Although he survives the second film, Hicks is immediately killed at the start of Aliens 3 when the drop ship crashes on a prison planet and he gets impaled by his own flight harness within his sleep capsule. It was a shi**y way for them to kill off such an awesome character and just one of the many reasons I consider Aliens 3 to be the worst film in the franchise.
But enough about that, how does Hicks fit in with Aliens: Colonial Marines?
"All I can really tell you about Michael Biehn's involvement is he's not just playing Hicks in the multiplayer," Newman revealed. "He does fit into the campaign in some way. It's really cool. I think you guys are going to get a kick out of it."
"At one point I was in the booth with Michael Biehn," he recounted a story of them recording lines. "Like he's right here, I'm right there. We're on stools with our little stands, and I'm reading lines, and he's reading lines. We're both shouting. Like, he's fuc*ing playing Hicks and I'm shouting with him."
"I'm like 'Is this my life because this works out pretty well. I'm feeling pretty good.'"
Although we don't quite know his involvement yet, I'm sure Aliens fans everywhere are glad to know the iconic character will somehow be included (as long as they don't just kill him off like the third film). For Aliens: Colonial Marines, it's just another way the game relates to the movies. It's that type of detail and tribute to the triology that makes me excited for this game.
